If I Could
by xJanzx
Summary: The sequel to 'Save You' and the aftermath of Ronnie's death
1. Chapter 1

**If I Could**

Jack stood outside the Vic, his feet planted firmly on the road that ran parallel to the red building. The night was silent, the darkness embracing the streets in its icy arms, enveloping him, until it was pouring into everything that he was. His heart felt as though it was in a vice, with every breath tightening a little bit more.

He just stood there, looking out into the darkness but not really seeing anything.

Everything was gone.

The ambulance and police cars.

The people.

All gone.

But he remained. He remained.

Standing in the last place she had been, the place she had drawn her last breath.

Jack's heart constricted in his chest, but he refused to feel it, refused to let himself feel it. He just kept on breathing, breathing through the pain until the only thing that remained in his mind was the desire to stop.

"Jack."

He heard someone call out his name, the sound was distant and strange. Immediately he whipped around, looking about himself in all directions. "Ronnie?" He spoke into the darkness, his eyes searching for her. "Ronnie?"

Roxy shook her head, the tear tracks on her face glinting beneath the orange glow of the street lights. "She's gone, Jack."

"They took her," he whispered, no longer looking at Roxy, his eyes refusing to settle on one person or thing. Just in case he missed her. "They took her."

Jack shuddered as the sobs agonizingly escaped from his body. The harsh wind whipped at his face, as a thousand bolts of lightning struck his already broken heart. The shattered pieces pierced every part of his soul, the light in him extinguished. He'd died the second her body had gone limp in his arms.

They had had such little time together, both pushed each other away, trying to deny the depth of their love – but they couldn't, not when they knew how much they loved each other. _Was this meant to happen? Is this some cruel joke that someone's playing on us? I'm not meant to love anyone, am I? Because whenever I let anyone close, they're ripped away from me._

A sudden thought struck him. _This isn't real. This isn't real. It's just a dream. A horrible, sick dream that I need to wake up from. I need to wake up._ Striding over to the side of the Vic, Jack's fist pummelled into the wall. His knuckles pounded into the flesh of the brick. Punch after punch left them cut and bleeding, the skin ragged and torn where once they had been healed. But nothing could wake him up.

Roxy's bottom lip trembled as she watched the man that loved her sister break in front of her. She rushed to his side, trying to take hold of his fist in her hands. "Jack, stop. Stop, stop it," she told him, her voice increasing in volume with each word.

"I have to wake up. I have to wake up. I have to. Let me wake up," he said, refusing to look at her whilst continuing to crush his fist into the red brick building. Jack felt a roar of anger surge through him. This place had caused her so much pain – so many things had happened here, so many heartbreaking things.

Finding out about Amy, her dad, Danielle. She lost her baby here. She lost everything here, in this building. She lost everything.

Jack wrenched his hand free of Roxy's, his body igniting with a white hot rage and his fists smashing against the building. His chest heaved with the exertion, his muscles screaming in agony for much needed oxygen, but he was too far gone now, venturing into a place where the fury engulfed him, the flames licking his skin and devouring every part of him.

"Jack!" Roxy shouted out to him, trying to break through the haze of an emotion so thick she thought it would suffocate her.

"Wake up!" He screamed, the roar ripping from his throat.

Before Jack's fist connected with the wall, Roxy managed to close her fingers around it. But his movements were too fast for her and the back of her hand was crushed between the brick and Jack's. She cried out in pain, startling him.

Jack's eyes fell to the droplets of blood that were rapidly forming between Roxy's broken skin. He drew his eyes away, locking onto the ice blue orbs. "I need to wake up," he whispered.

Roxy gulped, wanting nothing more than to collapse to the ground and let the time fall away. But she couldn't do that, not now. She shook her head.

"You're not asleep."


	2. Chapter 2

Jack looked at Roxy, as though her words had somehow stopped his heart from beating, stilled the ever moving muscle in his chest. His eyes were staring, unable to blink. And then it happened. The memories of the past few hours crashed down on his mind, the walls of his defences disintegrating almost instantly.

Tendrils of terror snaked through his body, wrapping themselves around his throat until he was choking. Retching and choking.

_"I promise I'll take care of her."_

Jack stepped away, doubling over as the bile rose at the back of his throat and poured forth from him.

_"I'll take care of our little girl."_

Jack felt as though someone had stabbed him in the heart, over and over again. He could feel the blade being pulled from his body before the cold metal was jabbed back into him with each memory that slammed into his mind.

He closed his eyes. Ronnie's smiling face filled the darkness. He remembered the touch of her rosebud lips against his own as he claimed her mouth. The warmth of her had washed over him like a cascading wave, chasing away the cold that had infiltrated his life for as long as he could remember. If he concentrated hard enough, he could almost taste her, smell the shampoo in her hair.

Jack opened his eyes.

She wasn't there.

She was gone.

His breaths came in heavy gasps, his lungs trying to compensate for the oxygen he had deprived them of. A slow poison coursed through his veins, pulsing through his organs, festering within him. He couldn't breathe, his chest heaved, but he couldn't breathe. A darkness tinged the edges of his blurred vision as Jack reminded himself to focus on something, anything.

_You're no good to her like this._

Jack narrowed his eyes, staring down into the ground. His breaths became slower, steadier. His body exhausted, he placed his right hand on the ground to balance himself. Jack flinched.

He'd touched something. Something cold and wet.

Turning his fingers over, he looked at them beneath the pale moonlight.

Congealed blood.

_Her_ blood.

Jack dropped to his knees, his arms fell to his sides, like a warrior laying down his weapons. He tilted his head upwards, looking into the inky black sky. The silence of the night pressed into his head, trying to muffle the voices in his mind, the ones that ricocheted off the walls and shot themselves into his consciousness. But it couldn't, there was no silencing the piercing words that she had spoken.

_"I'll take care of our little girl."_

Jack wailed like a wounded animal, a guttural cry roaring from his throat. His left hand clutched at his chest, pulling at the material of his shirt, as though trying to claw his heart out to stop the anguish. His fingernails dug into his skin, scratching and tearing at it. He wanted it gone. What use was his heart if she wasn't here?

Roxy propelled herself forward, crouching down on the gravel so she was level with Jack. She grasped hold of his hand, the tears streaming down her cheeks. "Stop," she ordered. "Stop it."

"She was pregnant."

Roxy felt her body freeze, an IV of ice flooding through her. "Wh-what?" She whimpered.

"She was having my baby."


	3. Chapter 3

Roxy couldn't breathe, the ground had shifted beneath her feet and she could feel her arms flailing out, trying desperately to hold onto something solid, to pull herself up from the pit she was falling into.

"Wh-what?" She gasped, her voice trembling.

But Jack stayed silent, cutting his eyes away from her and looking into the sky once more.

The reality of the situation crashed over him like a tidal wave. He felt as though he couldn't breathe, as though he was drowning in the depths of his despair. Jack closed his eyes, furrowing his brows to stop the onslaught of thought. Ronnie's face swam in front of him, her lips curved upwards in a secret smile.

_Ronnie looked up at him, the tears dancing in her eyes._

_"Tell me again," Jack murmured, his hands on either side of her face, as he looked into the eyes he could fall into._

_"I'm pregnant," she whispered, a giggle slipping from her lips as his arms wrapped around her. Holding onto each other, they were spinning in a bubble of bliss._

Jack's hands closed around air, his arms no longer surrounding her. He opened his eyes. She wasn't there.

She'd gone.

He could feel Roxy stood beside him, but he wished she would just go. He didn't want her here, because every time he looked at her, he saw the reason he'd lost the love of his life. He saw Ronnie's pain etched across her beautiful face, he saw her heart smashed into a million fragments of glass that couldn't be repaired.

"Get away from me," he stated, his voice like icicles against gravel.

"No. No! Not until you tell me the truth-"

Jack stood up and whirled around, the bottom of his suit jacket flying through the air as it followed his course. "The truth? The _truth_?!" He growled, rounding on Roxy as she cowered on the ground. His hands wrapped around Roxy's upper arms, his fingers digging into her flesh. "Ronnie told you the truth and you didn't believe her. She _told_ you and you called her a liar! He _raped_ her and you called her a _liar_!"

Roxy shook her head. "No, no, no. It's not true, it's not."

_"I'm pregnant."_

"You did this! You did this!" Jack yelled into her face.

_"I'm having your baby."_

"No, no, NO!" She screamed back, pushing against Jack's chest in an attempt to get away from his wrath. She could feel the grief rolling off of him in waves, so black and so deep she thought there was no end to it. It was a dark wave of fire, like molten lava on her skin, ravishing the flesh and only leaving a shell in it's wake.

But she had lost her too. Roxy had lost her sister too.

"She was my sister, Jack-"

"NO!" Jack screamed. "No, you weren't! Your dad _raped_ her and you didn't believe her. You weren't her sister!"

Roxy's breaths came in shudders, the full weight of her actions crashing down on her. Everything she had said and done, every conversation she had shared with her sister, every argument. Everything that had led to this moment.

"No! NO!" She wailed, no longer trying to push Jack away, simply trying to hold onto him. Onto the last person who had held her sister.

"You killed her."

"Stop it! Stop saying that, it's not true! It's not true-"

Jack nodded his head, his fingers not relenting as they continued to press down into Roxy's skin, so tight he knew he must be hurting her. But he didn't care. He didn't care about anything right now. He wanted her to hurt, to feel what Ronnie had felt, the strings that had bound her for so long. So tight they had been cutting into her delicate skin, the marks still evident on her broken soul.

Jack wanted Roxy to feel that. To feel everything that Ronnie had.

"You killed her," he whispered, his words like assassins in the night, creeping through the darkness and into Roxy's heart. He heard her whimper. His fingers became slack.

He turned away, his back to the sister that had caused Ronnie so much anguish, letting her fall to the ground. A guttural cry erupted from the depths of his shattered heart, the sound of a lion whose flesh was being torn apart by his kin. His body shuddered, the howls ripping from his throat with every breath he wished he couldn't take.

"Jack, where are you going?" Roxy shouted after his retreating back. "You can't go now, please, please – just take it back. Take back what you said! Where are you _going_ – you can't just go home."

"She's gone . . . I don't have a home."

**THE END**


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